Bringing God's Kingdom to Earth: Activism, Assassination, or Another Way Entirely?

My research into the New Jerusalem has proven constantly relevant throughout my research. Surprisingly often, the news cycle reminds me of aspects of the reception of Revelation's holy city that I'm looking into for this current DFG project.

This has been happening a lot recently. (In fact, it's part of why I wanted to study this topic in the first place.)

Tragically this time, it happened again last week with what seems to be the at-least-partly politically motivated assassination of Charlie Kirk.

Folks back home in America are talking more and more about politics and faith and how they may, ought, may not, or ought not come together, especially in light of the growing number of recent politically motivated assassinations or attempted assassinations in the USA. I'm thinking of, in the last year or so, the targeting of Charlie Kirk, Rep. Melissa Hortman (D-MN), and Pres. Donald Trump. I'm also thinking of the credible threats of hanging against Vice Pres. Mike Pence in the Jan. 6 uprising at the U.S. Capitol in 2021.

In light of what seems to be a huge uptick in politically motivated personal violence in the USA, and especially violence that is being committed or supported by people calling themselves Christians, I'd like to repost a short article I wrote about four years ago when I was finishing my PhD in Belgium (so long ago!). The upshot of the argument is that we Christians must be very careful indeed when resorting to politics--much less activism and even force--when attempting to enact "our" vision of the way things should be.

Why? Because, by all appearances, that's not how we bring God's kingdom to earth when we pray, "Thy kingdom come, they will be done on earth as it is in heaven."

God's ways are higher. Very, very much higher. See what I mean in my Theology Research News article, "Not Made With Hands," which explores politics and the building of the New Jerusalem through the lens of some incredibly compelling ancient Christian texts.

The heart of it is in these paragraphs, which I think diagnose an impulse amongst many politically activated U.S. Christians these days:

... Many [fourth-century] Christians found it impossible to resist the allure of [the new] a political arrangement. And [to this day], many have not been content to postpone [the establishment of Christ's Kingdom] it to the time of Christ’s return. Yes, good things come to those who wait. But what if we don’t have to wait? What if the ethically enlightened can precipitate the New Jerusalem here and, with the right policy, establish God’s kingdom now?

This impulse has shaped much of history. Fourth-century Christians — many of them adherents of the millennialistic view that Christ’s kingdom was soon to be established on earth — suddenly found themselves holding the reins of political power once Constantine and his increasingly Christian administration discovered that the city of God might in fact be at hand, and further, and that the church and her hierarchy were meant to enjoy more than merely spiritual authority. As the earthly representatives of Christ the almighty King, it seems they were mandated to wield political authority as well as ecclesiastical.

“Thy kingdom come” became therefore not something prayed privately, but a hope to be enacted publicly by culture, law, policy, and, when occasion demands, violence. After all, are not Christians called to speed God’s will “on earth as it is in heaven”? Thus did the earlier millennialist imagination of the New Jerusalem take on new life once Christian authorities became convinced that not only had the millennium already begun, but that they were in charge of it.

Anyway, read the whole article (it's a short read, and not too academic!).

Be sure to stay on til the end to learn about a classical Christian approach to the most radical political shift that history will ever know.

Because it's not what you think...


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Image: La Jérusalem céleste, Tapisserie de l’Apocalypse du Château d’Angers, France